Why are PQubes so reliable?

These are tough little instruments!

Harsh testing

We test the PQube 3v design right up to the limit: not just the usual temperature and humidity extremes like other instrument manufacturers, but harsh mechanical action (see video below), many kilovolts of voltages beyond specification, and beyond-Standard electrostatic discharge, radiated and conducted EMC, and more. It’s unlikely that you’ll ever reach these extremes in your application, but the PQube 3v’s job is to keep recording when something goes wrong. So we test them very, very harshly.

Standards-based testing

We work closely with Certification Laboratories like UL (Underwriters Laboratories), PSL (Power Standards Lab), TUV Rheinland, and others. Together, we make sure that the PQube exceeds all of the Standards-based requirements for safety, immunity to conducted and radiated emissions, and precision NIST-traceable measurements.

Harsh field experience

You’ll find standard PQubes in the steamy jungles of Papua New Guinea, at frigid airports in Alaska, on power poles in the hot Alabama summer sun, in the salt air on tanker ships and oil platforms, even on undersea remotely-piloted vehicles. We expect this. We design for it. We succeed, so you don’t have to worry.

Government Testing

The microPMU – a firmware variant of the PQube 3v – is used in the U.S. government’s micro-synchrophasor project, and is installed at harsh substation locations, and on difficult distribution lines, all over the United States. Despite the environmental challenges, since the full release of the project there hasn’t been a single failure. Not one. The Principal Investigator for this project calls this reliability achievement “astounding”. We don’t really agree – we expect this kind of performance from PQube 3v analyzers – but we’re pleased!

Statistics

We’ve been doing this for 15 years. We track our failures carefully, so we can correct them. For an individual PQube 3v, we know that the odds against a field failure this month is about 1,450 to 1 . (Based on our experience in the industry, this is about 14 times better than comparable instruments. You can see why we’re so proud of PQube 3v reliability!)

Do I need a PQube 3v or a microPMU?

This can be confusing – we’ll help you sort it out here.

The PQube 3 is a fully-certified power quality disturbance recorder, plus a fully-certified energy meter, plus a whole collection of additional recording channels.

The microPMU, or µPMU, is the ultra-precise Phasor Measurement Unit developed for the U.S. Department of Energy ARPA-E Micro-synchrophasor project. It measures voltage and current fundamental phase angles with a resolution of 0.001°, and magnitudes with a resolution of 2PPM (0.0002%). Time stamps are accurate to better than 0.000001 seconds.

The PQube 3 and the microPMU are exactly the same hardware, but are loaded with different firmware, and are passed through different calibration procedures.